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Local Commitments to Healthful Foods
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Local Commitments to Healthful Foods
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CTOBER IS ESPECIALLY important to me and, I hope, to all food and nutrition practitioners: It’s National Farm to School Month. Designated by Congress in 2010, Farm to School Month celebrates “the connections happening all over the country between children and local food” and demonstrates “the growing importance of farm to school programs as a means to improve child nutrition, support local economies and educate children about the origins of food.”1 Talk about a win-win situation; this is a win-winwin.
KIDS REQUEST BRUSSELS SPROUTS! In this space last June, I wrote about my county school district’s farm to school program, and the impact it’s had in the schools and throughout the larger community. And we are hardly alone. In the Oyster River, NH, school district, Doris Demers, DTR, is the director of child nutrition. Her priority is to help schoolchildren “learn to have a healthy relationship with food.” She adds, “So many children today don’t know where their food is coming from. The nutrient content is so much higher when we close the distance between the producer and the kitchen. If we involve and educate them about fresh and local products, they are more willing to try new things. We have seen a dramatic increase in the amount and types of fresh fruits, vegetables, meats and even fish that our students eat. In one school, the classes have a ‘tasting party’ where they sample some of the foods they have grown. I now have students requesting Brussels sprouts and cauliflower on their school menu!” Oyster River schools have entered into a partnership with the University of New Hampshire, where students in the Thompson School of Applied Science are growing fresh vegetables for the school’s program. “We will purchase them as a way to make this a sustainable program. We are thrilled about this partnership and can’t wait to see it evolve,” Demers says. ª 2017 by the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.
MAKING FARM TO SCHOOL MAINSTREAM On the opposite end of the country, Gitta Grether-Sweeney, MS, RD, is the senior director of nutrition services at the Portland, OR, public schools. “Farm to school provides an opportunity to teach students where their food comes from and especially which foods are grown in the state in which they live,” she says. “It gives schools another opportunity to focus on why it is important to eat fruits and vegetables. In many of our schools we have a ‘cafeteria bed’ in the garden and the food that is grown there is served in the cafeteria. I have witnessed students eating more fruits and vegetables when they have grown them and when we serve them.” “My predecessor had the idea to begin farm to school and serve a local menu once a month,” Grether-Sweeney says. “I wanted farm to school to be mainstreamed, so I made changes on the menu in order to make that happen.” Today, more than 36% of the food purchased by the school district is locally grown or produced.
HEALTHY SOIL, HEALTHY PEOPLE Farm to hospital programs also help bring healthful, locally sourced foods to community residents in a clinical setting. Lisa McDowell, MS, RD, CSSD, director of clinical nutrition and wellness at St Joseph Mercy Hospital in Ann Arbor, MI, and the team dietitian for the Detroit Red Wings of the National Hockey League, was instrumental in 2010 in creating the Farm at St Joe’s— the first farm on a hospital campus in this country. “Healthy soil is the foundation to grow healthy, nutrient-dense, greattasting produce which nourishes our patients, visitors, and staff and creates a healthy community where healing and prevention are paramount,” McDowell says of the hospital’s 25-acre farm. “There is tremendous synergy between the farmer growing the food, those caring for the environment, the
Donna S. Martin nutrition experts prescribing the food, and the physician treating disease. What they share is the end result of what we serve on our food trays. Healing the sick with fresh produce that tastes delicious, looks amazing, and provides the vital nutrients for health ultimately reinforces the educational message we so strongly believe: Great food is essential to great health,” McDowell says.
SUSTAINABLE FUTURE I hope these important programs can be part of our educational preparation for future practitioners. For dietetic internship directors who are interested in farm to school rotations for your program, a great resource is Growing Minds @ University (http://growingminds.org/farm-to-school-educationproject/), or GM@U, a joint initiative of the Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Project, Appalachian State University, Western Carolina University, and Lenoir-Rhyne University. Let’s work to create a sustainable future for our schools, hospitals, communities, and in all walks of life. Donna S. Martin, EdS, RDN, LD, SNS, FAND [email protected] http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jand.2017.07.026
Reference 1.
National Farm to School Month: Celebrating the movement. National Farm to School Network website. http://www. farmtoschool.org/our-work/farm-to-schoolmonth. Accessed July 13, 2017.
JOURNAL OF THE ACADEMY OF NUTRITION AND DIETETICS
1501
Local Commitments to Healthful Foods
O
CTOBER IS ESPECIALLY important to me and, I hope, to all food and nutrition practitioners: It’s National Farm to School Month. Designated by Congress in 2010, Farm to School Month celebrates “the connections happening all over the country between children and local food” and demonstrates “the growing importance of farm to school programs as a means to improve child nutrition, support local economies and educate children about the origins of food.”1 Talk about a win-win situation; this is a win-winwin.
KIDS REQUEST BRUSSELS SPROUTS! In this space last June, I wrote about my county school district’s farm to school program, and the impact it’s had in the schools and throughout the larger community. And we are hardly alone. In the Oyster River, NH, school district, Doris Demers, DTR, is the director of child nutrition. Her priority is to help schoolchildren “learn to have a healthy relationship with food.” She adds, “So many children today don’t know where their food is coming from. The nutrient content is so much higher when we close the distance between the producer and the kitchen. If we involve and educate them about fresh and local products, they are more willing to try new things. We have seen a dramatic increase in the amount and types of fresh fruits, vegetables, meats and even fish that our students eat. In one school, the classes have a ‘tasting party’ where they sample some of the foods they have grown. I now have students requesting Brussels sprouts and cauliflower on their school menu!” Oyster River schools have entered into a partnership with the University of New Hampshire, where students in the Thompson School of Applied Science are growing fresh vegetables for the school’s program. “We will purchase them as a way to make this a sustainable program. We are thrilled about this partnership and can’t wait to see it evolve,” Demers says. ª 2017 by the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.
MAKING FARM TO SCHOOL MAINSTREAM On the opposite end of the country, Gitta Grether-Sweeney, MS, RD, is the senior director of nutrition services at the Portland, OR, public schools. “Farm to school provides an opportunity to teach students where their food comes from and especially which foods are grown in the state in which they live,” she says. “It gives schools another opportunity to focus on why it is important to eat fruits and vegetables. In many of our schools we have a ‘cafeteria bed’ in the garden and the food that is grown there is served in the cafeteria. I have witnessed students eating more fruits and vegetables when they have grown them and when we serve them.” “My predecessor had the idea to begin farm to school and serve a local menu once a month,” Grether-Sweeney says. “I wanted farm to school to be mainstreamed, so I made changes on the menu in order to make that happen.” Today, more than 36% of the food purchased by the school district is locally grown or produced.
HEALTHY SOIL, HEALTHY PEOPLE Farm to hospital programs also help bring healthful, locally sourced foods to community residents in a clinical setting. Lisa McDowell, MS, RD, CSSD, director of clinical nutrition and wellness at St Joseph Mercy Hospital in Ann Arbor, MI, and the team dietitian for the Detroit Red Wings of the National Hockey League, was instrumental in 2010 in creating the Farm at St Joe’s— the first farm on a hospital campus in this country. “Healthy soil is the foundation to grow healthy, nutrient-dense, greattasting produce which nourishes our patients, visitors, and staff and creates a healthy community where healing and prevention are paramount,” McDowell says of the hospital’s 25-acre farm. “There is tremendous synergy between the farmer growing the food, those caring for the environment, the
Donna S. Martin nutrition experts prescribing the food, and the physician treating disease. What they share is the end result of what we serve on our food trays. Healing the sick with fresh produce that tastes delicious, looks amazing, and provides the vital nutrients for health ultimately reinforces the educational message we so strongly believe: Great food is essential to great health,” McDowell says.
SUSTAINABLE FUTURE I hope these important programs can be part of our educational preparation for future practitioners. For dietetic internship directors who are interested in farm to school rotations for your program, a great resource is Growing Minds @ University (http://growingminds.org/farm-to-school-educationproject/), or GM@U, a joint initiative of the Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Project, Appalachian State University, Western Carolina University, and Lenoir-Rhyne University. Let’s work to create a sustainable future for our schools, hospitals, communities, and in all walks of life. Donna S. Martin, EdS, RDN, LD, SNS, FAND [email protected] http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jand.2017.07.026
Reference 1.
National Farm to School Month: Celebrating the movement. National Farm to School Network website. http://www. farmtoschool.org/our-work/farm-to-schoolmonth. Accessed July 13, 2017.
JOURNAL OF THE ACADEMY OF NUTRITION AND DIETETICS
1501